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CaÃ±on City High School students Katie Abbott, left, Nani Albertson and Angel Potter unload Howard Disposal recycling bins from a trailer for their new 'Bringing Recycling Back' program Tuesday at the school. Jeff Shane/ Daily Record

Ca on City High School student Nani Albertson puts a sticker on a Howard Disposal recycling bin explaining what can be recycled for their new 'Bringing Recycling Back' program Tuesday at the school.
(Jeff Shane/ Daily Record)

Recycling is making a major comeback at Cañon City High School.

Senior Girl Scout Troop 255 recently partnered with Howard Disposal to offer a recycling program at the school called "Bring Recycling Back."

The program kicked off Tuesday with a schoolwide assembly outlining the plan and Howard Disposal dropping off 16, 95-gallon totes and a commercial recycling container. The totes are strategically placed around the school to collect No. 1 and No. 2 plastic.

"Eighty percent of all plastic thrown away is number one and two," said Christina McCullough, recycling coordinator/sales and marketing for Howard Disposal.

"Bring Recycling Back" is part of the Troop's "Girltopia" project that aims to improve the world.

"Part of improving the world would be keeping it around longer and having it be more healthy," said Katie Abbott, sophomore and troop member, "like less pollution from the factories that have to make new plastic."

Sophomore and troop member Angel Potter said the project is important to her because plastic water bottles count for one-third to one-half of school's trash.

"We get cases of it every day, and a lot of people just throw them away," she said.

Troop member Nani Albertson, a CCHS freshman, said she realized the amount of plastic that is wasted, and she wanted to do something to prevent that.

"I've seen the commercials you can reduce plastic, but we need to reduce it so we can reduce greenhouse emissions," she said.

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Katie said the idea of a recycling program interested her because she is a "tree hugger."

"I mentioned to the lunch lady about all of the plastic bottles that they have because I see them in the hallways all the time, and no one picks them up," she said. "I figured that if there's that many, it would be very beneficial to actually get some recycling in the school."

The school recycles cardboard and paper, said John Butts, head custodian at CCHS. He is in full support of the new program. Having more recycling and less trash actually makes the custodians' loads a little lighter.

CCHS Principal Brett Meuli said with more than 1,000 students and almost 100 staff members, a lot of waste accumulates at the school.

"Anything that we can do to help -- we know we're throwing stuff away that can be useful -- that's wasteful not to recycle," he said. "With the number of kids we've got in the building, we've got a lot of plastic."

He said the CCHS Environmental Club has committed to keeping the program going in the school.

The school does not have to pay for the recycling service.

"This is total awareness," McCullough said. "We want to be a part of education, and this is what it is."

She said Howard Disposal owner David Howard thoroughly researched the recycling program before implementing it in the Cañon City area. A pilot curbside co-mingled, single-stream-recycling program was launched earlier this month in Dawson Ranch.

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